


Things Stranger Than Reality

by Kitty_KatAllie



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy, Stranger Things (TV 2016), The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: Basic Stranger Things Plot and THAT'S IT, Eleven | The Kid | Grogu, Ex-Marine Luke Skywalker, F/F, F/M, M for Monsters and Murder, M/M, Sequel Trilogy Teenagers, nonverbal grogu, sheriff din djarin
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-22
Updated: 2021-02-23
Packaged: 2021-03-12 03:47:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 16,088
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29628618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kitty_KatAllie/pseuds/Kitty_KatAllie
Summary: Nothing happens in Hawkins, Indiana. It’s one of the reasons why Paige and Rose Tico moved across the country from California. But one early Monday morning, at exactly 3:42 AM, something even worse than Oakland’s everyday violence began to hunt through the shadows of that sleepy, safe, little town. And Rey’s the only one who knows.In the same town, the too-tired Sheriff Djarin has had enough to deal with. Emergency calls about power outs, conspiracy theories about military experiments at the town lab, and a war vet with a too pretty smile and great coffee took all of Din’s time. He never thought life would change, each moment routine and numbing while his past mistakes haunted him. Until a combination of mysterious murders, disappearances, and reports of a wild feral child in the woods turned his life upside down. Perhaps he should’ve listened to Skywalker’s wild theories a little sooner…
Relationships: Din Djarin & Grogu | Baby Yoda, Din Djarin/Luke Skywalker, Leia Organa/Han Solo, Poe Dameron/Finn, Rey/Rose Tico
Comments: 20
Kudos: 39





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by a post by julchenawesome! See it [here](https://julchenawesome.tumblr.com/post/641705231316598784/why-nobody-is-asking-for-a-dinluke-au-stranger#notes) Look, it's happening!!
> 
> The first chapter was just too damn long. So. I made some of it a prologue! Hoping y'all feel that first five minutes before the title card vibe~ Also, I've never written horror genre before. I hope it works out!
> 
> Warning: I *am* using most of the actual plot of the first season of ST. The characters themselves are vastly different from the show (Din and Grogu are the most like their show counterparts), but anything else is basically spoilers for season 1.

There was a delicious thrill at sliding out of Poe’s red-orange Sunbird when the whole town was asleep. The dingy little trailer park looked almost ethereal when the only light came from a single street lamp casting a buttery pumpkin orange light over everything. Rose grinned, feeling a little wild and wide-eyed, as Rey slid over the back of the convertible and landed neatly on her toes beside Rose. Finn was still snoring in his awkwardly twisted position while Poe in the driver’s seat shook Finn gently.

“So, you glad you played delinquent with us on a _school_ night?” Rey whispered, leaning in close enough Rose could feel the warmth of her body. They had spent the entire drive from Indianapolis curled up in the backseat, the autumn wind dragging through their hair and goosebumps puckering any bare bit of skin. So Rey leaning so close shouldn’t make Rose’s cheeks heat _now_.

“Yeah, yeah, you were right. It was fun,” Rose agreed, laughing softly and nudging Rey away. Rey fake-cringed, clutching at the ribs Rose just elbowed, and then winked. Rose only rolled her eyes and leaned on the door next to Finn. Who was finally blinking and yawning awake. “You coming out of there any time soon? It’s past three. I’m pretty sure Poe wants to get _some_ sleep tonight, ball chaser.”

“’mcomin,” Finn slurred, rubbing at his face. He squinted at her teasing smile. “Not a ball chaser. _Poe’s_ a ball chaser.”

“Only every day of the week. That’s kinda my job as the school’s star forward.” The other three all groaned at Poe’s customary bragging. “I’m doing fine. No rush. Do you need me to help you home, Finn?” Poe asked, smiling at Finn’s bleary glare.

“Oh, we’re back?” He broke off with yet another yawn. Rey rolled her eyes and Rose snickered.

“You’re definitely holding up better than this guy,” Rey muttered to Rose. She moved Rose out of the way to open the car door herself and drag a sleepily protesting Finn out. “Don’t baby him, Poe. See ya in three hours?”

“I’ll bring enough coffee for everyone,” Poe promised, his roguishly charming smile slanting over his face. For every dumb jock brag, there was a moment like _that_ and it made Rose remember why they all liked him despite his popularity and big head.

“Thank you,” Rose said fervently.

She had a Calc test in third period and there would be _no way_ she would pass it without coffee. Especially _Poe’s_ coffee that he made strong enough to burn a hole through her stomach lining. He gave her a wink as if reading her mind, then glanced in concern at Finn, whose arm was now wrapped around Rey’s shoulders, before finally driving off. The three friends watched his taillights disappear into the dark. The silence was interrupted by Rey’s yawn this time, and Rose quickly ducked under Finn’s other arm to help her hold him up.

“Ah, c’mon, I’m not _that_ sleepy, I got this,” Finn whined even as he grinned at both of them.

“Your house is first, ball chaser, ‘s no problem,” Rey teased. Finn laughed, and the three of them stumbled and giggled their way through the quiet park towards the farthest side.

Rey and Finn lived right next door, their almost identically rundown and dingy vinyl-sided trailer homes barely an arm’s span apart. Their entire lives they had lived next door, playing in the dirt and astroturf in hand-me-down sneakers and shapeless Goodwill shirts. They hadn’t even known how odd it was for a white girl and a black boy to be so close that they could all but read each other’s minds until they’d gotten into public school where the students all naturally segregated themselves in a podunk town like _Hawkins_. Luckily, by the time Rose had moved into town in her freshman year of high school, most of that kind of thinking was covered up and everyone pretended like it had never happened. Nah, good old-fashioned classism had shunted them off into the ‘poor kids’ group instead. No one wanted to be friends with the trailer park kids, except for other trailer park kids… and, mindbogglingly, _Poe._

Just last year, Poe Dameron, high school basketball and soccer ace somehow joined them, smiling his suave, ‘cool kid’ smile at Finn’s side, driving his ‘rich kid’ Sunbird up to invite Finn and his trailer park friends to hop in and get milkshakes at Cantina Pizzaria. Sure, Finn had joined basketball and baseball and was getting to know those jerk jocks, but none of them had really given Finn the time of day regardless of his talent. Until Poe had. And then refused to leave Finn’s side ever since.

And now, here Rose was. The Asian nerd with rock band posters on her wall, creeping home at three in the morning on a _Sunday_ … well, _Monday_. After going to a _rock concert_ in Indianapolis almost four hours away with actual best friends. They’d had to miss the last few sets, but Rose was still thrumming with adrenaline, the bass from the stage amps still buzzing in her ears. They hadn’t even been that famous, but she and Rey made it a habit to listen to as many new bands as possible. You never know who’s gonna be the next The Clash.

They made it to Finn’s house first, and he wobbled his way up the rickety, hollow-metal porch. With a short wave, Finn slunk into his house leaving Rose and Rey alone under the lamp post.

It flickered over their heads and Rey frowned up at it.

“Didn’t they just fix that?” she muttered, rubbing her arms.

“Well, you know Hawkins. Probably didn’t waste a lot of money on it,” Rose said with a shrug. “Probably took it from a bin of used bulbs.” She shoved her hands deep in her jacket pockets and realized it was Rey’s hard-earned bomber jacket. She had forgotten that Rey had put it on her at about hour two on the freeway. She moved to take it off, but Rey quickly brushed her hands away and resettled it on Rose’s shoulders.

“Give it back in the morning. You still gotta walk home,” Rey whispered, her green eyes looking soft in the low, orange light. Rose ducked her head to hide what was probably a dopey smile.

“It’s two minutes around the corner,” Rose protested halfheartedly, tucking her nose under the collar of the jacket. It smelled like old, used leather and Rey’s off-brand shampoo, and it probably shouldn’t make her feel _this_ warm. It wasn’t like it was brand new or had great insulation.

“Still two minutes more’n me. I can, um, walk you? To yours?” Rey offered. Her eyes were on her feet, taped together combat boots scuffling the pavement.

“ _Rey_ ,” Rose said on a laugh. “It’s _less_ than two minutes. And this is _Hawkins_ , not Oakland.”

“Yeah, yeah, city girl, nothing happens in Hawkins,” Rey said.

Their eyes met again and Rose wasn’t sure what was happening to her own face, but Rey’s expression, as unreadable as it was, had Rose’s heart thumping double-time. She looked so pretty with her silky brown hair tangled all around her face, the droop of her sleepy dark eyes, and the cute little arch her left eyebrow always had. Rose really needed to stop filing away all those quirks of Rey’s face like some sort of creep. The street lamp overhead flickered again, breaking their silent gaze when they reflexively looked up.

“You should, um, get going. Before it goes out. We’re barely gonna have enough time for nap, anyway,” Rey pointed out, clearing her throat lightly and staring off to the side.

“Um yeah,” Rose muttered, cheeks hot. She turned on her heel quickly and began to ~~not run~~ walk quickly away.

“Hey, Rose?” She looked over her shoulder to see Rey standing under the beam of orange light. “Walkie me when you get home, okay? I won’t go to bed until you do!”

Rose grinned and shook her head. She jogged towards home as the light flickered again.

By the time she turned down the path towards her trailer, way at the farthest edge of the park and out of Rey’s sight, the light was flickering almost nonstop. It was dumb, _so_ dumb, but her heart was beating faster, her pace picking up. Suddenly, without Finn or Rey, the shadows seemed darker, almost dangerous. She gasped and stumbled to a stop, eyes wide and hands shaking. There, outside the park’s chain link fence, she’d seen… no. This was _Hawkins_. She and Paige left California behind, found this tiny sleepy town in the middle of nowhere Indiana to be as safe as possible. Paige had been barely nineteen and Rose fifteen at the time. The idea of sticking around that city after their parents… after all the violence there had taken their parents away from them so suddenly, it had been impossible and terrifying. Nothing happened _here_. There weren’t any random… people stalking around the trailer park at 3 AM.

But her breath was catching and the light was flickering faster, the black outs lasting longer and longer. She started hurrying home again, breath panting harshly between her gritted teeth as the shadowy figure all but zipped past her peripheral. The keys in her hand jangled and her heart thudded so hard against her sternum she thought the bone would crack. Leaves shuffled, but there wasn’t any wind. She flung herself into her house just as the whole park was plunged into darkness.

Paige was working the graveyard shift, it was one of the reasons why Rose agreed to sneak out to the city that night; she would be able to avoid her sister’s overzealous protectiveness. At the time, it was exciting and _daring_. Making Rey grin like Rose was some kind of brave 'troublemaker' had been enough reason to say yes and not feel the least guilty about using Paige’s overworked schedule to her own advantage. Now, the emptiness of her crummy little house was ominous. Too big and too small and too dark. She leaned back against her door, breath shuddering past her trembling lips, keys hanging from her fingers. The walkietalkie she’d tossed onto the couch before racing out to meet Rey and Finn was easy enough to find as she shook her head and tried to laugh off the ridiculous fear.

Rose heard it then and her grip almost cracked the plastic in her hand.

The low rumbling growl.

It sent every nerve in her body into flight or fight. Or _both_ , as she raced over threadbare carpet to the back room. To the little safe under Paige’s bed. She flung herself to the floor, dragged it out, and, with shaking fingers, rolled the lock open on muscle memory. Inside were birth certificates and immunization cards and security number cards. Obits from the Oakland newspaper with her parents’ names at the top and sepia-toned wedding pictures under that. Most importantly, the coolly alien feel of rough plastic met her fingertips. The too smooth metal of a snub-nosed barrel. She shoved the walkietalkie into the bomber jacket pocket as she backed into a sitting position.

Her eyes were wide, so wide they stung, but it was so dark that she had to pop out the chamber blindly. The small, mostly full box rattled, but she managed to slip six small bullets into each hole and set the chamber back in place. The safety latch clicked under her thumb.

For long, painstaking moments there was only silence and her own harsh breaths echoing in the heavy darkness of her sister’s bedroom. Then, her heart stopped. Her whole body quivered with the need to run, but she could only scooch back on her ass, jeans rasping over the carpet until her back hit the fake wood panelling of the wall.

The shadows in the corner of the room were jerking and twisting to form a gruesome shape that crawled like an animal over the floor. Then rose, rose, rose, tall enough to be a man but _wrong_. Her mind was screaming as tears burned down her face and her arms raised. The hammer pulled back under her thumbs more easily than it ever had the few times her sister had made her practice.

They should’ve stayed in Oakland.

* * *

Metal dug into knees. Soft hands scraped over various unseen debris. Water, slimy and smelly, splashed against skin.

He was cold. Colder than he had ever been.

He tumbled out of the little hole in the ground, shivering harder when wind slapped against every bit of bare skin. There was a lot of it.

For a brief moment, he stood there. Huddled into himself, bony arms wrapped tight around his stomach, skin bumpy and the tiny, almost invisible hairs on his limbs standing straight up.

Around him was… big.

So big.

Nothing but the bloody gown he wore was white. Everything was black. Dark. The ceiling was high, so high he couldn’t see the corners, and little dots and one big spot were glowing overhead.

Stars. Moon. He’d only seen them in pictures before.

He stepped forward. Beneath his bare foot it squished and crunched. Mud. Leaves. He crouched down and poked at the strange floor, eyes wide as wind scattered the brown leaves. Dead dead dead, the leaves were dead. But it smelled good. He wanted to press his nose into the floor and breathe in the smell of it all, the mud and leaves and _air_. But it he was staring at the dead leaves, unable to look away.

Like the man in the room. Blood had been everywhere. There was still screaming in there, behind him. There was a loud terrifying _crack_ , a _raprapraprap_. Guns.

He looked behind him. Saw the lights flickering.

Heard the _roar_.

He started running. The mud became dirt and it was easier to run, he didn’t slip so much. His breath wheezed past his teeth and his chest insides _hurt_. But he didn’t stop running.

It was coming.

He let it out. He let the monster _out_.

He was crying, he could feel the tears burning down his face, blurring his vision, but he didn’t stop running.


	2. Monday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It didn’t feel right to be here. Kuiil was in the fucking morgue, there was a teenage girl (with a gun) missing, and a tiny nonverbal kid running hungry and barely dressed in the woods. And he was coming home in time for pizza and beer. Maybe Luke wouldn’t mind digging out some flashlights and going searching again?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Edit: Moved the trigger warnings here So dumb putting them at the bottom only... wow.
> 
> Warnings: lots of gun talk, and mildly descriptive imagery of blood and ... murder? death. Warnings for death. Some less than PC/ableist remarks about Luke's mental health.

_Crack!_

_Crack!_

Rey sat up, eyes blinking away sleep as her half-doze ended abruptly. Everything was utterly black. The only noise was the quiet _shuushing_ of the walkietalkie still loosely hanging from her fingers on the bedspread.

But that… that sound that woke her… that was a _gun_ … right?

Rey rubbed at her eye and squinted over at her alarm, barely able to read it in the moonlight. 3:42. She raised her walkie to her mouth.

“Rose? Rose, did you make it home?” Rey released the button, but the only reply she got was more white noise. She frowned and pressed down again. “Rose, did you hear that? Was that… was that from over by you? Rose?”

Again, only the _ssssshhhh_ of radio static replied. Rey changed the channel, heart squeezing too tight.

“Finn? FINN! Wake up!” Of course his walkie was off. With a scoff, Rey got to her feet and scrambled for her flashlight. It clattered to the ground and she fumbled around until she got it up and pointed at her window. She turned it off and on rapidly, aiming exactly where Finn’s stupid sleeping face would be. She saw shadows flailing in the dim starlight across the little astroturf area between their windows.

“WHAT!” Finn cried through the walkie. She could see his silhouette in his window now, running his hand over his short buzzed hair.

“There was a gun! I heard it!” Rey snapped back.

More _sssshhhh_. Then, “Rey, what are you talking about?”

“The _gun_! It came from Rose’s. I _know_ I heard a gun and it came from that way and she hasn’t walkie’d me like she promised.”

She trembled all over, heart thudding painfully. Something was wrong. Rose was _in trouble_. There had been _gun shots_!

“Rey… there weren’t any guns. I didn’t hear anything.”

“Yeah, well, you were probably already asleep.”

“I don’t think I’d sleep through _gunshots_ , Rey. Maybe _you_ were asleep.”

“I was _not_. Why hasn’t Rose walkie’d me!?”

“Because _she’s_ probably asleep. It’s, like, maybe four in the morning… hey, is your clock working? My light isn’t working, either.”

Rey hurried over to her door, stubbing her toe on her bedframe and cussing a bluestreak under her breath. The Old Guy slept like the dead, luckily, so she doubted he’d wake up, but she still stopped to hold her breath and listen. She flipped her light switch… then flipped it again. Then, a couple more times. That sickening gross feeling clawed at her guts as the light stayed resolutely off. She licked her lips nervously before crawling over her bed to squint at the alarm clock once more.

“Y-yeah, mine’s not, either. My clock’s stuck at 3:42.”

“Mine’s digital, so who knows what time it is now. Damn it, how are we supposed to get up for school?”

“Finn! That’s kinda _not important_ right now. Do you remember the _gunshots_ and Rose!?”

 _Ssshhhh_ And then, “Rey, I’m sure there weren’t any gunshots. If your flashlight woke me up, then gunshots definitely would.”

Rey curled up on her bed and pressed the hard plastic corner against her forehead. Another swift lick over chapped lips. “You sure?” she whispered.

“Yeah, Rey, I’m sure.”

Lights flickered and suddenly she blinded all over again. She groaned and dragged herself over to the wall to turn her light back off. Meanwhile, Finn was muttering about the time and his watch.

“It’s already 4 o’clock. I’ll wake you up in time for school and we’ll go get Rose together, all right?”

Rey slumped against her headboard. Outside no one was moving around or calling out. If there _had_ been gunshots, someone else would’ve heard them, too… She pressed down on the talk button. “All right.”

“Get some sleep, Rey. This is Hawkins, remember?”

“Right.” She exhaled roughly through her nose, not quite a laugh. Her walkie shut off and she slowly, reluctantly, set it down next to the clock.

Sleep didn’t really happen, though. More like a light doze teasing sleep until she heard the echo of a shot, a tinny whisper of a scream: _Rey!_ And then her eyes would creak open and stare at the street lamp outside, her tongue heavy and her heart a stone. When her clock clicked over to 6:12, she was dressed and ready for the day, hands clasped between her knees and her eyes dry and itchy. The entire time, until the sky had lightened to pearly grey, the street light had remained a steady, constant beam. The moment she saw Finn leave his house, Rey grabbed her bag from the floor and slammed out of her room.

From the ratty recliner under a mound of afghans and a tray covered in hospital-esque food, her grandfather wheezed.

“Young ladies do _not_ slam doors-” he began in his annoyingly condescending whisper of a voice.

“Okay, bye, I’m going to school.”

“It’s not with those _miscreants-_ ”

“Oh no, I definitely found a _bunch_ of brand new friends, all of them Stepford perfect girls,” Rey sassed with an eyeroll, already yanking open the door. Before her decrepit old grandfather could wheeze worse things past his withered lips, Rey was out the door. And slamming it behind her for good measure, grinning joylessly. She jumped off the side of the porch— it didn’t have a railing so wasn’t exactly a _feat_ — and ran over to Finn.

“You know Poe isn’t even here yet, right?” Finn said with a yawn. He handed over a piece of toast all but dripping in Smucker’s grape jelly. The one he kept for himself was more peanut butter than bread and Rey scowled in distaste just looking at it.

“Yeah, and you know who _else_ isn’t here? Rose. Let’s go,” Rey said around the first mouthful. It stuck like glue (or like peanut butter) in her throat, but she forced it down as she dragged Finn through the park behind her.

“Whoa, Rey, c’mon, slow down, I’m gonna drop my breakfast.”

“You know Mom will just make you another,” Rey said absently, heart thudding and jelly smearing over her fingers.

“Yeah, but she’ll give me a _lecture_ about wasting food first.”

“Oh horror of horrors.” She stomped up the steps to Rose’s door, Finn hard on her heels, and all but fell through the unlocked door.

It was empty. And silent. She ran through the house, but nothing looked too weird. Rose’s bed was always an sloppily unmade and for some reason Paige’s door was left open a bit, but there weren’t any messes. She even peeked through the cracked door, ignoring Finn’s hissed warnings, but only saw some boxes sticking out from under the bed, but nothing else.

Finn grabbed her arm before she could barge in— _nicely, barge in nicely_. “Paige will _kill_ you if you sneak in there. Look they’re both not here, right? Paige probably drove her to school already. Rose might’ve got caught sneaking back in last night, you know how Paige gets. She’ll be grounded for a month.”

Rey scowled at him, but… it made sense. Why Rose didn’t walkie or wait for them and Poe, and it even explained why both sisters were gone. Rose had said Paige would be working past 6 AM, but she _had_ come home early in the past. Rey shoved the rest of the soggy toast in her mouth, grimacing as she choked down what tasted like sweet, wet sand. Finn dragged her out the door towards the trailer park entrance. As she slipped into Poe’s backseat and took the thermos he handed back, she couldn’t help but stare into the rows and rows of boxy, dingy homes. Something was still… still niggling at the edge of her mind.

The door… She realized it as coffee burned in her belly and Hawkins High loomed in front of them. The front door had been unlocked.

* * *

Waking up was a struggle on the best of days. Today, assuredly not a best of days, it clung to his eyes and limbs like thick, clinging webs. His back ached, his neck ached, good _God_ , his eyeballs ached. Though, that was probably the early morning light searing through his eyelids. Groaning and spine cracking, Din sat up on his equally groaning and lumpy couch. He rubbed roughly callused hands over his face, wondering for the fourth day in a row if it were worth the time to shave. It wasn’t like he was all that good at growing anything too bushy. His thumb ruffled the patch of facial hair along his jaw as his bleary eyes roved over the coffee table in front of him.

He would never hear the end of it if the station found out he passed out on his couch again.

 _Don’t you hurt yourself enough running after all those bad guys, Djarin? Aren’t you too old for falling asleep any time and anywhere you lift your feet?_ I’m _too old for that and I’m a spring chicken compared to_ you _, Sheriff._

Din groaned again. Didn’t he deal with that guy enough without his voice in his head? He pushed himself to his feet and started stripping off yesterday’s overly wrinkled uniform. If he didn’t have another one here, there would be a spare at the office. Iggy, the office assistant more efficient than five employees combined, always made sure of that.

He shuffled his way towards the tiny, poorly lit bathroom over thin, creaking floors. He barely recognized that man staring wearily back at him. After three years, he thought his shit would be back together. That he would find a routine and learn how to feel real again.

Instead that stranger’s face stared back, features blurred by watermarks on glass and nearsightedness.

His morning routine was a five minute shower that barely had enough time to warm up and a tooth brushing he barely remembered if it weren’t for the foul morning taste being replaced by overly fake mint taste. ~~No, he didn't shave today either~~. His clothes were thrown into a mostly full hamper and his sheriff khakis and plain white tee were replaced with more sheriff khakis and a plain white tee. After he pulled on a new pair of socks, he paused to stare at his unused bed. He couldn’t remember the last time he slept there. His pillow wasn’t dented and his covers were laid out pin neat and barely ruffled from him sitting at the edge.

There was that voice in his head again, teasing and concerned. He leaned over to sigh into his hands. Maybe next year this date wouldn’t hurt so bad. Maybe next year he wouldn’t mourn something that wasn’t even dead. Just not his anymore. Maybe next year waking in his silent house wouldn’t be so deafening.

The mockingly empty bed was left behind and he was in the kitchen, drinking the last of the milk out of the carton and writing it on his grocery list. He had gotten a bit behind, but he could catch up easily. There wasn't any bread for toast, and the sight of Eggos he _definitely_ didn't buy sitting in his freezer had his lips twitching upwards before he closed the door. The spring chicken could eat them the next time he kicked Din off his own couch for the night. He grabbed a bag of jerky out of a cabinet instead and then froze, hands on his keys, when he noticed a bunch of bananas on the counter. There weren't too many brown spots... but when the hell did he buy those? Did they arrive with the Eggos?

Din rolled his eyes upwards and heaved a sigh, then snagged a banana before stomping out his front door.

His mobile home was pretty far out of town, pretty far from anyone really. It was set back into the woods that surrounded Hawkins, and the driveway was more an extended side road until he bumped and rolled onto the main road into town. Main Street was filled with teens on bikes and the everyday business folk headed to work. A few of them waved and smiled, and he nodded back. Most of them were waving because they'd known him as a child rather than because of the Sheriff’s wagon he hauled around. He had only been back for three years and they’d already folded him right back in, as if he had never left for the big city twenty years ago.

He walked into the sheriff's station a mere fifteen minutes after leaving home. The hum of voices, Iggy’s ever present typing, the ringing of the dispatch line... for a moment it felt like he missed a step; a tiny, almost imperceptible lurch in his stomach. And then that familiar laugh rang out and the missing step was under his foot. Deputy Dune left his office just then and smirked at him.

“Well, don’t you look like something the cat dragged in. Is that a pillow crease or a couch imprint on your face, boss?”

Din's eyes darting towards the office before he glowered at her. Dune laughed, hard enough her shoulders shook, and walked past him. Din continued to frown at her back, striding through his office door. The source of the earlier laughter was perched on the edge of his desk, slim hips in tattered jeans and an overly baggy and sun-faded Beatles tee hanging from deceptively narrow shoulders. Deceptively, because Din had seen this scruffy and slender thirty-something throw a drunk twice his size over a knee with one hand.

Not that you would ever tell with that boyishly charming smile lighting up the beige and tan office the moment Din stepped in and tossed his hat on the chair. A smile like that didn't belong on a man like Luke Skywalker, but somehow it really really did.

“Morning, Sheriff!” Luke chirped.

Din glared from behind his sunglasses. “It’s eight AM, Skywalker. “

“That _is_ why I said morning, not evening. It’s always eight AM when you come to work.” Luke rolled his eyes, still grinning. Until he caught sight of the jerky pack in Din’s hand. “That is not your breakfast.”

“I had a banana.”

“That I left there like 3 days ago. I know you can cook, Djarin.” Those blue eyes had the gall to narrow in _judgement_ at _him_ when Luke was wearing tattered hemp moccasins. Din moved around him, removing his shades to pinch the bridge of his nose.

“It’s eight AM and I don’t have coffee,” he almost groaned.

“I got it, boss,” Dune said, setting it down in front of him. And another one she handed to Luke. “What’s this about cooking? Why haven't you cooked for _me_?”

Din was eyeing his coffee dubiously, need warring with apprehension, when Luke flopped into a chair with a laugh.

“Don't worry, I made it. You can drink it without choking.”

“I do _not_ make coffee that bad. You're both just weak.”

Din sighed in relief and took the first blessed sip. When his eyes opened, he noticed the overly-washed canvas bag on his desk and his jerky suspiciously gone. When had that deviant stole it? He glared at Luke, who winked and tossed the jerky to Dune.

“Oh goodie. Djarin gets a real breakfast from Kuiil’s and I get junk.”

“That's not Kuiil's, that’s all Skywalker. And yours is on top, Cara.”

Dune's dark eyes gleamed greedily. Out of the reusable bag she lifted a covered glass dish. When she lifted the lid, the smell of maple syrup and bacon filled the room. She moaned in appreciation and all but ran from the room.

“Bless you, Skywalker!” she called over her shoulder.

“Stop feeding my deputies. They'll follow you home.”

Luke just grinned and lifted the next dish out. “I guess I'll feed ‘em again, unlike some people, I _like_ friends. But I'm only good at breakfast food, so I hope they like eggs and carbs.”

“Who doesn't.” Din uncovered his own short stack of pancakes. After a quiet moment, he looked up at Luke’s innocent expression. “What is it.”

“What is what?”

Din leaned back and crossed his arms over his chest. He hadn't had a single bite and it was obviously irritating the shit out of Skywalker. He raised an eyebrow as the man fidgeted. Finally, Luke let out a gusty sigh.

“Fine!” He threw up his hands, and Din noticed it was the hook today. Sometimes Skywalker got a kick out of going handless so he could snicker behind the backs of the people who nervously looked anywhere _but_ his wrist stump, other times rolling his eyes at Din whenever someone stuttered something about ‘thank you for your service’. The hook probably helped with the bag, though. “There were power outages all over the county. Or at least, that’s what the news was saying, but from what _Han_ was telling me-”

Din snorted derisively. He began to eat, raising an eyebrow when Luke huffed.

“Hey, he’s a voter, too, _Sheriff_. When is election season again?”

The eyebrow was joined with the other one and Din took another bite. Luke’s mouth twitched upwards, before he flapped his left hand and continued.

“ _Anyway_ , power outages were actually more _just_ in Hawkins. _East_ Hawkins.”

Din pinched the bridge of his nose and regretted taking the bribe in form of breakfast foods.

“Skywalker, not this again.”

“That _lab_ shouldn’t be here! They’re _nefarious_ , the entire _military_ is nefarious, Din! You need to be pressuring the Mayor to kick them out before it goes from power outages to, I dunno, child experiments and nuclear explosions!” Luke snapped.

Din’s eyes were already rolling upwards at the word ‘nefarious’ being used. “You realize _you_ have more sway with the Mayor than I do,” Din repeated for the thousandth time. Luke shuffled in his seat and scowled out the window behind Din’s head. “And there are no nuclear… anythings in that lab. No government regulators would allow something like that so close to so many civilians.”

“Right, like the government has ever cared about towns like Hawkins. We barely have enough people to fill the shopping mart.”

“Luke, it’s a _science_ and _medical_ lab. There are only a bunch of white-suited nerds going in and out of there,” Din said wearily. He side-eyed the pancakes, then shrugged and kept eating. The horse had left the barn already.

“I feel like I should be offended for nerds everywhere.”

“Like you were a nerd.”

“I could’ve been!”

“I’m also from Hawkins. I remember the town’s _golden boy_. Something about leading our baseball team to victory for the first time in a decade? Getting a football scholarship to Notre Dame-”

“Okay, okay, I was a jock. Please stop throwing my dark past in my face. Don’t you have any heart, Sheriff?” Luke interrupted quickly with a red face.

Din exhaled through his nose heavily, not quite a laugh though his lips ticked upwards. Skywalker always had a way of tricking Din’s sense of humor. Even when, in his next breath, the younger man began a spiel about all the terrible no-good things the military lab could be doing with all that electricity they’d obviously stolen. Din wasn’t really sure how something like that was possible— did electricity even work that way? He’d always been better at _math_ than anything really science-y in school. When he scraped his plate clean, and Luke was in the middle of a gruesome description of what happened to the human body after being pumped full of electricity— _thanks for that_ — Din noticed that there was only one plate on the desk. There was a mug of coffee in front of Luke, but nothing else.

“How much sleep did you get?” Din asked abruptly. Luke stopped mid-word and grimaced.

“Enough.”

“My enough and your enough are very different.”

“Now, _that_ ’s a lie. You never sleep much, especially this time of the year,” Luke pointed out mildly.

Din scowled and shoved the dishes into Skywalker’s canvas bag. “Skywalker.”

Luke picked up his mug and tapped the side of it with the point of his hook. Watching as he played with the mechanism, the hook opening and closing restlessly, Din was pretty sure of the answer coming.

“Maybe three hours. Or… one.”

Din sighed roughly. “And you’re not eating.”

“I ate! At home!”

“Eggos?”

“Eggos are delicious.”

Din leaned on his elbow and buried his face in his hand. “Go home, Skywalker. Eat, sleep, leave me alone.”

“What, and have you be a miserable grump tonight when I come over with pizza? You know my sunny disposition is the only thing that gets you through the day,” Luke joked.

“And you’re a pain in my ass when you’re running on fumes and caffeine. I will kick you out of my house, and I really don’t want to.”

“Ha!”

“Because I want the pizza.”

“Hey!”

There was a brisk knock and both men looked over, almost eerily in sync, to see Dune leaning through the door with a serious frown on her face. “Djarin, we have an actual police problem out there. And it ain’t old Maz’s cats again.”

“Emergency?”

“Enough of one. You know how useless the fire department is. A bunch of people are having issues with their power and there’s been an accident in eastside. Apparently the only light over there is on the fritz, a couple’a cars kissed on the corner of Lilac and West.”

“Are you…? Fuck, all right. I’m coming.”

“I _told_ you that light was a dumb idea. Why did you let the Mayor get away with that stupid town improvement crap?”

“He’s your dad.”

Luke scowled and held up the hat Din had tossed aside when he came in. “It’ll be a cold day in hell that my dad actually listens to anything I say.”

“Well then. There’s your answer.” Din shoved his sunglasses back on and swallowed the last of his coffee. Luke took the mug, still frowning and actually concerned. The moment he opened his mouth, Din raised a hand to cut him off. “You’re not actually a deputy. Go home, get some sleep. I’ll see you tonight.”

“Fine. Don’t go kissing cars on Lilac.”

“Shut up, Skywalker.”

The last glimpse Din got of Luke, he was grinning like the little shit he was. How a man in his mid-thirties managed to look like that freshman all-star Din could still vaguely remember was something of a miracle. More so because of what little of the everything he knew Luke had been through. Not that he would ever say anything like that _out loud_.

He was a lot less bleary and exhausted by the time he made it to the corner of Lilac and West. Dealing with the idiots who were both shouting and blaming the other felt more like watching a badly made sitcom than a useless exercise in patience he figured it should have been. It was obviously on account of the not-terrible coffee. After the car accident, there were a few other disturbances around the area. Mainly angry residents who wanted to know what had happened— Din couldn’t answer, so he just let them rant at him— and others who still didn’t have power back— a quick check showed they just needed to flip a switch in their power breakers.

As he and Dune got to the last call, an actual serious issue of someone setting their kitchen on fire when they dropped a candle, Din couldn’t help but notice they were barely two miles out from the Hawkins Lab. He scowled, sipping at coffee from the thermos Dune had made up for both of them. Skywalker was obviously getting into his head, but he couldn’t help but notice that, although the calls had come from several neighborhoods, they had _all_ been within a two mile radius of the lab.

“What is it?” Dune asked from beside him. He startled a bit, glancing over at her in question. “You got that big city detective face going on.”

“I haven’t been a detective in a while.”

“Three years isn’t ‘a while’. I’ve had relationships last almost as long. Well, one relationship, but you get my point,” Dune said.

“Sure.” Din sipped at his coffee again. Dune huffed, a begrudging smirk on her face at his customary lack of follow-up. To put her out of her misery, he jerked his head down the inter-city highway. “The lab. Did you notice where all these calls are from?”

Dune’s smirk slipped as she thought it through. She rolled her eyes. “You can’t be serious. Luke’s been bitchin’ about that lab for _years_ and you’ve never listened.”

“I _listen_. He just didn’t have any evidence. Or a point. _This_ … this is looking a little too much like evidence. I don’t like it.”

“Do you honestly think they’re up to something _nefarious_ , Sheriff?”

Din snorted quickly. “No, I just don’t like it when he’s right. He makes me pay for the pizza.”

Dune laughed out loud, slapping his back and curling around her stomach. Din allowed himself a small smile, just a little tip upwards on the side of his mouth. The radio _bzzt_ ed to life behind them and Dune leaned back into the 4x4, balancing on her toes to reach the radio. Din kept staring down the highway towards the lab as he poured the last dregs of their coffee onto the gravel road. He jerked around, staring through his dark shades at Dune’s pale and equally wide-eyed stare, as Mythrol's, the dispatch coordinator, message ended.

“I’m sorry, did you say a _possible 187_ , over,” Dune said. As Din ducked in, Dune squirmed out of the way.

“Yes, a possible 187 on-”

“Was that Kuiil’s address?” Din demanded, cutting Mythrol’s reply off by rapidly tapping his speak button until Mythrol figured it out and shut up. Dune was already yanking open the passenger door, expression set and hard.

“Yes, Sheriff. It was called in by-”

Din slammed the radio down and threw himself into the driver’s seat. They were skidding over gravel and speeding to the far edge of town in seconds. The lights were flashing, though the siren was off. It should’ve taken more than twenty minutes to get that far down the highway. Within fifteen, the Chevy Blazer was screeching to a stop. Kuiil’s Diner had been the grungy little truckstop diner just outside Hawkins for almost fifty years. The owner was a short, gruff, stubborn old man. Throughout his life, and especially in those rough high school years, Din would bike his way down the highway and spend hours there. It had been a refuge for the foster kid with a bad attitude and no town spirit. He still came pretty often, even dragging Luke with him a few times in the past three years. It was for washed up old men and women, and truckers who wanted a coffee or to rent a shower in the back before heading back onto the interstate a few miles past Kuiil’s. Kuiil wasn’t like a father figure. He was just… Kuiil. Just _there_. No questions, no expectations. A burger and fries in a basket and an ear to listen when Din had grumbled about school, and, much later, town citizens that kept wanting him to arrest neighbors for stealing lawn gnomes.

There was an ambulance already there, and someone’s blue sedan. It made him pull up short, heart hammering against his breastbone. That blue sedan was familiar, and this was the _worst_ week to be reminded of it. Then, he saw her standing next to the back of the ambulance, arms wrapped around her waist, naturally tan face looking unnaturally pale, as a paramedic spoke to her.

He strode over to her— anger, confusion, and something like _fear_ — all battling in his chest. On his heels, he could hear Dune’s quietly muttered cursing.

“Omera, what are you doing here?” Din all but snapped. Omera startled and looked over at him, mouth parting. That’s when he noticed the tear tracks on her face and the too-wide blackness of her pupils.

“Oh God, Din, I’m so sorry. I… I just found him-” She cut off and looked away, a shaking hand over her mouth.

Din stared, mouth working uselessly. His eyes darted towards the paramedic.

“She’s struggling with shock, Sheriff. We recommended a sedative, but she refused. She said-”

“I’m _right here_ ,” Omera interrupted. Hearing that annoyance made it easier for Din to pull himself back together. With a gesture, the paramedic nodded and stepped away, Dune following him with her notebook ready. Trusting Dune to ask the right questions, Din walked up and, hesitantly, set a hand on Omera’s shoulder. She flinched, but didn’t shake him off.

“Omera, what the hell are you doing in _Hawkins_ and calling in a dead body?” Din asked, words blunt but tone soft. Omera stepped closer and grabbed his wrist. Her dark eyes met his looking _haunted_.

“It’s Kuiil, Din. I know I never met him, never saw him, but you described him enough. It’s Kuiil in there. God, I’m so sorry.”

Din pulled his hand away, letting it fall and clench into a fist. “What happened?” he asked dully.

Omera dragged in a slow, shaking breath. “Kuiil called me. It was maybe seven thirty this morning? He called the office and said he needed to speak to me, only me. He said there was… there was a child here. Some tiny kid who couldn’t speak and looked terrified. _Lost_. He didn’t trust, what’d he say? Government goons. But he knew about me through you and he’d trust me,” Omera recited, voice still shaking, but smiling slightly at the ‘government goon’ memory. That definitely sounded like Kuiil.

“A kid?” Din repeated. He should probably be writing this down.

“Whoever he was, he’s gone. They… whoever did this, they got here _fast_. He called Indianapolis social services at seven thirty and I came straight here. It took less than three hours? Maybe? God, I don’t even know what time it is.” Omera laughed, brittle and shrill, and buried her hands in her hair.

“You… Damn it, I need to take you to the county office, take your statement… Winta, she’s in school, right?” Din asked.

Omera glanced up through the mess of hair that had fallen out her professional bun. It was so familiar it _burned_. “Yeah… yeah, Winta’s fine. I should have time… I’m not a suspect, am I?” she asked, frowning.

“For now, no. There’s no reason…” Din broke off as another car came squealing down Kuiil’s drive. Rocks and dust resettled under the tires and two more deputies hurried out of the car. The tech van pulled up right behind them. “I gotta handle this and I can’t… I can’t take your statement. You get that, right?”

“Yes… don’t want to seemed biased when you ask if your ex-wife murdered a friend of yours,” Omera said dryly. Then, she abruptly covered her mouth again, almost retching. “Oh God, it was- it could be a _murder_. I just…”

Din sighed and dragged her close. She clutched at his back, fingers curling into his coat, and broke into a peal of sobs. She couldn’t stop whispering _Oh God_ under her breath, over and over, as Din’s shirt got steadily damper under her face. He sighed again and patted her hair.

He’d fucked up four years ago, but Omera had, for some dumb reason, never hated him. Never blamed him. Only smiled and let him go. The least he could do was spend a minute pretending like he wasn’t completely out of his depth and hug her while she cried. He looked around to find Dune, saw her directing the new deputies to put up crime scene tape before following the techs, and their equipment, inside. As if she could feel his attention shift— maybe she could, after five years of his attention always pulling away, maybe she could sense it happening— Omera pulled away and wiped at her eyes. Her mascara was smeared and her lipstick was long gone. He wished he had _something_ — a handerchief, a fucking spare tissue, _something_ — but he just stood there, hands hanging at his side uselessly, as Omera collected herself, by herself. His fingers clenched and relaxed.

“I’m fine. You… you go do your job. Find whoever did… did _that_ ,” Omera told him, suddenly fierce and furious, but still too pale. She bit her lip. “And the child, Din. Kuiil wouldn’t have called me like that for a lie. There _was_ a child. You have to find him.”

“Him?” Din asked. He actually reached for his notepad, fingers barely shaking.

“Yes. Kuiil said it was a little boy, hair buzzed short, missing one of his front teeth. He said he wasn’t good with kids, never had one himself, but he didn’t even look ten years old, and was, I quote, scrawny as a half-starved cat,” Omera listed off. “He thinks the child wasn’t white, maybe mixed or African-American, Kuiil wasn’t sure. But he couldn’t speak. He kept using his hands and grabbing things, ate so fast he barely breathed between bites.”

“What about his clothes? Did Kuiil say?” Din asked, pencil scratching swiftly.

“A hospital gown.” Din’s eyebrows jumped up and he stared at her. She shrugged wearily. “That’s what he said. He might’ve given him actual clothes before… before…” Omera glanced towards the diner.

“Okay… okay,” Din muttered under his breath. He tucked the notepad and pencil stub away, then reached out and laid a careful hand on her shoulder. “I gotta get in there. Over there? That’s Deputy Erso.” He waved the young woman over when he caught her eye. “She’ll take you in, get your statement. Ask for coffee, even if you don’t want to, you need something hot.” Omera nodded, chin trembling. “I still have your home number, so just don’t leave Indianapolis. Make sure we can contact you if we need to.”

“I… I understand,” Omera said slowly. She inhaled sharply, but breathed out slower, steadier. “Din…”

“I get it. Go with Erso. Get home to Winta.”

“I got her, boss,” Erso said. She put an arm around Omera’s shoulders, a little awkwardly, but her voice was kind and soft. Din was already turning towards the diner, fervently wishing he didn’t have to go in. “Lucky for you, the station’s nutty mascot came by this morning. There should be some good coffee left.”

“Um… thank you? That’s not… a very kind thing to say…” Omera said hesitantly. “Din!” He paused before slowly turning to look over his shoulder. Omera smiled, tiny and unsure. “She got your gift. Came just in time for her party and she loved it. She misses you.”

He closed his eyes, grateful for the sunglasses hiding most of his face. With a quick nod, he turned back to the diner and didn’t look back again. Inside, the techs and his deputies had already set out several evidence markers. Actually, not even several. There were maybe three or five. He scowled as he walked around the diner, but no more markers were in sight. The back door was strangely broken based on the damage to the doorjamb, and Din paused to squint at it a little closer. Deputy Rook was already outside, following a tech who was carefully taking pictures. Finally, he headed to the table where the small group were carefully taking more pictures and bagging what little evidence there was.

A basket of half-eaten fries. A tipped plastic cup of pop. The broken white mug that used to be full of coffee now a puddle under Kuiil’s unmoving feet.

Din removed his glasses and crouched next to Dune. Her mouth was pulled into a thin line, eyes dark and sad. Like Din, she often came here to talk shit with Kuiil and drink coffee even more sludge-like and disgusting than her own. Both of them stared, grim and silent, at Kuiil’s slack and bloodied face.

“.22. Looks like point blank, maybe a silencer,” Dune muttered, fury making her voice shake. Din nodded; he’d seen the marks on Kuiil’s temple, too. She got to her feet abruptly, all but snarling. “Who the hell breaks into a truckstop diner and kills the owner with a _silencer_? Kuiil’s been in Hawkins his whole life. There’s no way he was secretly a fucking gangster or ex-mafia don.”

“The till?”

“Emptied. Pretty sure they wanted it to look like a robbery, but it’s too clean, Djarin,” Dune said, rubbing a hand over her hair. “And it could just be the shape of the pistol’s barrel, but it _looks_ like a silencer. Robbers in nowhere Indiana don’t have _silencers_.”

“And they didn’t break in.” Dune looked over at him. He jerked his chin towards the backdoor. “The damage shows it’s outward, someone, someones maybe, broke _out_ the backdoor. Which means they didn’t have time to unlock it, but the front door doesn’t show any signs of damage.”

“Wow. None of that makes any sense.”

“Nope.” Din frowned and stepped back when the paramedics came in with a gurney. He nodded to let them carry Kuiil away, and he and Dune watched in silence as they rolled out. “He opens up at four for the first truckers to roll in. He called Omera at seven thirty, and she got here before ten thirty. Why was the back door broken open? And where’s the kid? ”

“The kid? Is that why Omera was here? Kuiil called her to come pick up a _kid_?” Dune asked incredulously.

“Kuiil knows Omera works in social services, I’ve told him. He would’ve called her himself instead of the Sheriff’s office to… help me out, I think,” Din said, tone softer, almost guilty. Dune clapped a hand to his shoulder to squeeze it gently.

“Yeah, I think he would’ve, too. But, Djarin, there isn’t a single sign of a kid. Well, unless the fries and pop weren’t Kuiil’s. I thought it was weird, with the coffee _and_ the pop on the table. And Kuiil doesn’t normally eat out here.”

“He didn’t.” Din agreed, rough and low. Dune winced at the past tense. “I’m going to look outside. Put in an APB and amber alert for a kid, less than ten, wearing hospital scrubs, shaved head and missing front tooth.” He didn’t stick around to hear or see Dune’s affirmative. There was a kid out there, some kid that Kuiil wanted to help, and maybe, just maybe, it got him dead. Even if that didn’t make a lick of damn sense.

Every deputy not already busy was called down to the area to start a search.

* * *

Rey was fidgeting. The teachers were used to her fidgeting, really. She’d never gotten the hang of sitting still, not when she could be moving instead. And everything in her _screamed_ to be moving. It was already five minutes to the lunch break and Rey hadn’t seen Rose _anywhere_. They didn’t share many classes; Rose was actually the brainy one. Rose always tried to brush it off, saying California had an advanced curriculum compared to some nowhere town middle America, but Rey had seen Rose’s homework. Had even gotten help from Rose for her own. Rose might not be a genius, but she worked hard and understood things quickly. Most of her classes were junior year rather than sophomore year classes. But Rey still _saw_ Rose during the day. Breaks at their lockers. Passing in the halls. Meeting in the math hallway bathroom to whine about algebra II and calculus. But no Rose showed up.

The moment the bell rang, Rey was out of her seat, bag bouncing against her spine. She hadn’t even bothered to take the books out. The teacher probably hadn’t noticed. Her beat up sneakers squeaked over linoleum as she darted through the halls. Finn and Poe were at Finn’s locker, both laughing about something, the _morons_. They turned with surprised eyes just in time for Rey to sock them in the shoulder, _hard_ , making them wince.

“What was that for?” Finn asked, bewildered.

“She _isn’t here_!” Rey snapped. They stared at her. Then, Finn’s eyes widened.

“Rose? Rose isn’t here?”

“No! I’ve been trying to track her down during every break and I haven’t seen her!’

“Maybe she’s just been too tired and went straight to classes? We got in really late. I’m probably gonna bail on practice today. I’ll just trip over a ball and land on my face if I tried,” Poe said, though he was frowning as he spoke.

“She wouldn’t do that. She wouldn’t just _avoid_ me, and she’d have to if I didn’t see her,” Rey disagreed. Finn wrapped an arm around her shoulder, tucking her closer to his chest where she leaned with a sigh.

“We’ll check the cafeteria, okay? Just real fast, and if we still don’t see her, we’ll go ask her teachers. They’ll know,” he suggested.

It was probably useless, Rey _knew_ Rose wouldn’t be there, but she nodded and couldn’t help but hope. God, she _hoped_ she was wrong. She didn’t know why, but the longer she didn’t see Rose, the worse that heavy horrible feeling settled in her gut. Something was _wrong wrong wrong_. She _knew_ it. But she let Finn drag her towards the cafeteria, still tucked close to his chest, Poe on her other side and slipping her bag off her shoulder from under Finn’s arm.

She wasn’t there. And Rey’s heart pumped in overdrive as her eyes darted from face to face, table to table. No Rose. _No Rose_.

“Whoa, Rey, take it easy, _breathe_. Hyperventilating isn’t gonna help Rose,” Poe said quickly, rubbing her back. She nodded, eyes stinging and chest tight.

“Ugh, you’re not gonna like it, but I see someone we can ask,” Finn said, actual distaste curling his lip. Rey blinked and followed his gaze. Her lip automatically curled, matching Finn’s expression exactly.

“You’re _kidding_ , right?” Rey demanded, voice still a little too breathless.

“Unfortunately, no. They both have Mrs. Unduli for third period, right? Rose says they’re even friends,” Finn said. He rolled his shoulders back and adopted a pleasant, business-like smile. “You stay here and I’ll be right back.”

“The last time you tried to talk to Solo, you both got a week’s detention, Finn,” Poe interrupted, grabbing Finn’s elbow and yanking him back. “I’ll go.” Finn rolled his eyes, but stayed put and let Poe walk towards the table where Ben Solo sat with a few other of his angry friends.

They weren’t even bad kids. There were rumors about some of them smoking behind the gym or chucking rocks at cars in the junkyard at the edge of town, but nothing really bad. Just… _assholes_. Rey and Finn hadn’t really had a problem with them, probably still wouldn’t have, if Ben hadn’t been total _tool_ to the both of them almost their entire lives. He’d mellowed out in the last year or two, somehow Rose had become his _friend_ , incredulously, but Finn and Rey wanted nothing to do with him.

Rey watched, hands clenched into fists at her sides, barely feeling Finn’s hand rubbing her shoulder encouragingly, as Poe put on his ‘I’m the Nice Guy Here, You Can Trust Me’ smile and leaned against the table near Solo. A few of the worst of the lot glared at him for daring to breathe their air, but Ben just looked up, listened, then got to his feet. Poe frowned, but followed as Ben walked up to where Rey and Finn were standing. Both friends stood up straight, spines like steel rods and barely controlled scowls on their faces.

“Rose wasn’t in class,” Ben mumbled, eyes on the ground, then darting upwards to glare somewhere around Rey's right ear, not quite meeting her eyes. “She’s in my first and third, and she wasn’t there for either. I thought you all played hooky today. Didn’t you have that stupid concert last night?”

“And we all came home together and were supposed to come to school together!” Rey snapped, stepping almost onto his toes. Her finger all but punched him in the middle of the chest and he grunted softly. “Why the hell did she tell _you_ about the concert?”

“I know you can’t believe it, but we’re actually _friends_. I know she told you that a thousand times,” Ben retorted, towering over Rey. God, she _hated_ how much taller everyone was to her. She had the intense and burning need to cut his knees out from under him.

“Okay, okay, Rose isn’t in school, so now that _that’s_ been confirmed, we need a plan,” Poe said, jumping in quickly and placing a palm on Ben’s chest and Rey’s shoulder to gently shove them apart. Rey huffed and crossed her arms over her chest, and Ben slapped Poe’s hand away.

“Why didn’t she come to school with you, if you _planned_ it?” Ben asked, still frowning and staring at Rey.

“It’s my fault,” Finn said. His mouth was twisted to the side and his shoulders tense. “I told Rey she must’ve gotten a ride with Paige.”

Ben was already shaking his head. “I sit out on the quad until the bell rings. I would’ve seen Paige drop her off.”

“Creepy,” Rey hissed under her breath.

“ _Observant_ ,” Ben hissed back.

“Then, we’ll go straight to her house after school, okay?” Poe suggested. He grabbed Finn’s shoulder and shook him a bit, making him almost smile. “It’s not your fault. I thought you were right, too.”

“It’s _my_ fault. I _knew_ something was wrong. Finn, I _told_ you I heard-” She broke off, glancing at Ben and then staring at the hole at the toe of her shoe.

“Heard what?”

“None of your business.”

Rey turned on her heel and stalked away.

“Rey! Wait! What about lunch!” Finn ran after her, his hand around Poe’s arm to drag him along. Poe just sighed and let himself be led. Ben glared darkly after them, fisted hands deep in his jeans pockets, shoulders high around his ears. 

* * *

The sun was actually setting by the time they made it back to the sheriff’s office. Everyone trudged to their desks or lockers, covered in leaves and dirt and nothing to show for it. At least Omera’s car was gone, thankfully, and Din retreated to his office to read the report surely waiting for him from the techs and medical examiner. He pulled up short in the doorway when he saw the tall, lanky brunette slouched in a chair, boots up on the desk.

“You wanna lose your feet, Solo?”

Han jerked to attention, boots hitting the ground, and he grinned winsomely at Din. “Sheriff! You really know how to keep ‘em waiting!”

“Solo, today is _not_ the day to-”

“Look, _you_ know that _I_ know what happened. You also know I could’ve walked over there and read that file and you never would’ve known,” Han said, waving a magnanimous hand towards the manila folder on Din’s desk. Din scowled at Han’s still winsomely smirking face. That Din, not for the first time, wanted to punch. “But I didn’t, because I’m an honorable man.” He even pressed a hand to his heart as he spoke.

Din snorted.

“So just answer a few questions, for the press, for the _people_ of this great town, and I’ll be outta your hair.”

“Ongoing investigation,” Din grunted.

“So you’re gonna play hardball. I’m hurt. I thought we were buddies, Din. You’ve been to my house, you babysat the rugrats-”

“I am _not_ a babysitter. I was visiting Luke.”

“Luke doesn’t live with us and you know it. You were tagteaming watching the terrible twosome because you’d never leave Luke to do that alone. Why do you think we actually ask Luke to babysit?”

Din frowned. “I’m going to tell him that.”

Han grinned wider. “Whatever you say, buddy.” The grin fell and there was something actually serious and genuine in his eyes as he leaned froward. “Din, I know old Kuiil was a friend of yours. Me n’ Chewie liked the old bastard, too. He was great at poker, wiped my wallet so clean Leia still gives me grief about it.”

Din sunk into his chair, dropping his hat and shades to the desktop, and sighed heavily.

“Just give me something here. People are really freakin’. There hasn’t been a murder in Hawkins since… shit, _ever_.”

“1961.”

“That’s over twenty years ago! I was still in Asia, hunting down commies for interviews in the jungles, jeez,” Han leaned back and ran a hand through his hair. “Can you at least say if it’s homicide or suicide?”

“It’s a suspicious death,” Din replied wearily. “It wasn’t suicide.”

“Okay, okay, that’s something.” Han dug out his beat-up old notepad and made a few notes. “Any signs of break in? Robbery?”

“On. Going. Investigation.” Din bit out.

“Why was an Indianapolis social services agent at the scene?”

Din startled in place and stared at him. Han shrugged. “I don’t even…” Din sighed and rubbed his face. “I’m sure you’ve heard the APB, then.”

“Yeah. That kid’s connected?”

“There’s been no sign of him, but it was confirmed that Kuiil called social services and was dead before she arrived. We don’t know how the child is involved, but we know he was there. He could be an eyewitness.”

Han whistled between his teeth. “Sh _it_ , a kid that young seeing something like that? The APB report said younger than ten.”

“Unconfirmed. But yeah, he’s young.”

“Jaina and Jacen… god, they’re six, he could be their age. And he’s out there in the woods, on the run, after seeing a _murder_?” Han said, eyes wide.

Han was so good at pretending like life didn’t touch him, that everything was a hand of cards and he was there to play, but every now and then, Din glimpsed this man. The man that Luke adored as a brother, that a woman like _Leia Organa_ had married within a year of meeting, that had three kids he basically raised while his wife dove headfirst into politics. Din wanted to punch Han Solo at least 95% of the time. The other five percent Din had a grudging respect for that kept him from actually punching.

“Keep to facts, or I’ll sic your wife on you,” Din said, opening the manila folder and glaring at the single piece of paper inside. There was a _murder_ in his town and he had less than five pieces of insubstantial evidence and a single testimony from his _ex-wife_ of all people.

Fuck his life, seriously.

“Does Luke know?” Din looked up at Han’s question, his eyebrows already rising. “That Omera was in town.”

Oh. Din frowned, eyebrows now low and almost touching the bridge of his nose. “I don’t know. Why does that matter?”

“I dunno, because your _ex-wife_ was in town and maybe Luke should know.”

“Again. Why does that matter.”

“God, you’re both obtuse.”

His eyebrows fell even lower into a baffled glower. Han pushed himself out of his chair and checked his watch. He muttered a curse under his breath.

“I have to start dinner or the twins’ll skin me. All right, I’ll make sure to keep to the facts, but there’s gonna be an article first thing in the morning. Any updates, you got my number.” Han jabbed a finger in Din’s still glowering direction. “Call Luke.”

“Get out.”

“I’m going, I’m going.” Han raised his hands and started out the door. He stopped and looked back. “Good luck. Whoever did that to Kuiil… get him.”

His frown softened slightly, and Din nodded once. 

After a few hours had gone by, and Han was long gone, Din wondered just how much more he _could_ do. There hadn’t been any fingerprints at the scene, in fact, not even _Kuiil’s_ prints had been anywhere, and the techs had gone over it all three times. The money from the register hadn’t turned up anywhere, and neither had any sort of gun. They knew the body had been moved, that the blood patterns hadn’t matched up to where he supposedly died, but there were no other blood sprays or patterns to show where he might’ve been shot. Probably in the diner, but there was no actual evidence of it.

As for the kid, there was nothing to prove he’d ever been there other than Omera’s testimony. And, as Dune pointed out, Kuiil wasn’t one to drink soda pop of any kind, especially not while also drinking coffee. At the back and outside near the backdoor, there had been some signs of someone, but there was no telling if it were a kid or the burglar-murderer.

Din tapped at the photos of the back of the diner. There hadn’t been any other signs of more gunshots, which was strange. If the kid had run, why hadn’t they tried to shoot the witness? How did the door get bust open and why? His fingers tapped restlessly. This was honestly the only lead they had, but their afternoon of searching had uncovered nothing. Perhaps the scared-stiff kid had heard all their noise and hid? That was… feasible. It wasn’t that far from Din’s house, he could… He grabbed his shades and hat and swiftly got to his feet.

“Sheriff Djarin, there’s… are you going somewhere?” Iggy asked as he leaned awkwardly through Din’s door. Everything Iggy did was a bit stilted and awkward. He was tall and bony and overly literal and a great assistant, just _awkward_.

“I was planning on it. Whatever it is, it’ll have to wait-”

“No, it _can’t_ ,” interrupted a fierce young woman’s voice. Paige Tico, one of the newest citizens of Hawkins with a sister barely a few years younger, pushed past Iggy. Behind her, three teenagers looking shifty-eyed and pale, followed closely. “My sister is _missing_. She’s _been_ missing since around 3:42 this morning.”

Din stared, glancing towards Iggy, at each teenager’s face, and finally to the gleaming tears that Ms. Tico was stubbornly refusing to let fall.

“Aw, hell,” Din whispered. He fell against the side of the desk and scrubbed a hand over his face. Then, he straightened his shoulders and gestured towards the chairs (only two for the four people standing there). “Let me get a notepad. Iggy, water.”

“Immediately, Sheriff.”

Din stared at the notepad, his forehead on his hand, and his pencil tapping the desktop rapidly. The teens had all but spoken over and stuttered around themselves like tongue-tied toddlers, but he was pretty sure he’d gotten their story straight. Unfortunately, the steady and resolute young woman, Paige, had either been working late at the Walmart distribution center a good thirty minutes out of town, or sleeping on her couch where she had barely managed to stumble getting home from a double-shift. He looked back at the teens, each eagerly waiting and reeking with guilt and fear.

“This is everything?” he confirmed, glancing over the three and then to the sister.

“Yes.” Paige’s hands were clasped between her knees, one leg was bouncing.

“You said you keep a gun in your house and the ammo box was missing six?” Din repeated, voice carefully bland.

“We moved here from _Oakland_ and our parents- um, they owned a convenience store. They…” Paige broke off and breathed heavily through her nose. “Our dad bought that gun for our mom, and we all learned how to shoot. I keep track of how many bullets because my dad taught me to be extra careful when it comes to gun safety.” Paige got her feet and slammed her hands on the desk. Din’s eyes widened as the girl barely 20 years old and half his size snarled at him. “I _know_ the last time that gun was taken out and how much was left in that box. Someone was in that house and Rose went for that gun.”

Din scrubbed his hand over his face. A bewildering homicide, a missing child, and now a missing teenager? How… _why_? He stood up and walked over to his door. Paige gasped furiously and the teenage girl leapt to her feet like a shocked cat.

“Dune! I have another APB.”

Dune walked into view and took the notepad he held out. She glanced it over with pursed lips and her eyebrows arched upwards. “Starcruise Park? The trailer park? We had a call there this morning. The candle.”

“Within the radius.”

“Fuck,” Dune murmured with feeling. She met Din’s eye. “He’ll never let you live this down, Djarin.”

“She’s sixteen, no jokes.”

Dune looked over his shoulder to see Paige and the teenagers, and grimaced. “Right, sorry. Don’t mind me, Paige, I’m an asshole.” Paige’s mouth trembled into a smile, but her eyes were wide and baffled darting between them. “I’ll be right on this. I’ll send out Erso and…?”

“Andor just got his gold last month and they work well together. See if there’s a tech that can get off the diner case for as long as they need.”

“I’ll _make_ one get out there and back asap,” Dune promised darkly.

He opened his mouth, then shut it with a heavy sigh through his nose when Dune left too fast for him to warn her not to threaten bodily harm. Too late. He turned back to Paige.

“Ms. Tico, your house is a crime scene,” Paige inhaled sharply, and it almost sounded like a sob. The girl teenager grabbed at Paige’s hands and they held on to each other with white knuckles. Probably should’ve said that nicer… “I know this is a difficult situation, and I don’t know if this helps, but if there wasn’t any sign of blood or anyone left at the scene, there’s a good chance she’s alive.”

Paige and the girl were staring at him, jaws clenched so tight the muscles ticked just under the skin and tears streamed down their faces silently. “You’re not lying?” Paige asked at last.

“The chances aren’t good, I can’t lie about that,” Din admitted with a small shake of his head. “But they’re better than they could be. Do you have somewhere you can stay?”

“I would say stay with me, but the old guy is a dick,” the teenager said through a thick, damp voice. Paige chuckled without humor.

“Thanks, Rey. Um, yeah, I’ll stay at the Motel 6. Will it be long?”

“Depends on what we find. You can file your expense with Iggy at the front desk. He’ll get you reimbursed,” Din told her. Paige nodded, breath shaking past her bitten raw lips.

“Okay. Please, just… find Rose?”

Din stepped up and placed a hand on her shoulder. “I’ll do everything I can.”

He watched them troop out, the two teenaged boys huddle close around the girl. The one boy who looked like that Dameron kid rushed to open the door, and Dune slapped his notepad to his chest. Din grabbed it with a grunt.

“This is getting nuts. Crazier than Luke’s theory about LSD in the water.”

“I’m actually starting to wish the LSD thing was real,” Din muttered. He sighed and side-eyed her.

“Don’t even-”

“Want some overtime?”

“ _Damn it_ , Djarin.”

“I need someone at Kuiil’s overnight. Rook always wants extra shifts, take him with you,” Din suggested.

She crossed her arms over her chest and shrugged. “It’s true and he isn’t entirely annoying. But maybe I had a date tonight.”

“Did you?”

“Hell no. Even if I did, I’d cancel, I’d be the worst date with all this shit going on.”

“I’d do myself and you know it, but the county won’t let me pay myself overtime,” Din said with a grimace.

“Only because you overtimed yourself so much the _Mayor_ noticed.”

“I still think Luke was behind it,” Din said with narrowed eyes.

Dune chuckled and clapped his shoulder. “Speaking of, it’s almost eight.”

“So- _oh_ ,” Din hurried back to grab his things from the office before running towards the door, keys jangling in his coat pocket. “Get Rook to sign in for overtime, if anything happens, make sure you call me _immediately._ I don’t care what time.”

“I don’t get why you want a watch on Kuiil’s.”

“That kid could come back, or we can hope the criminal is stupid. I just want you two there, _all night_ , Dune,” Din ordered. “And make sure Iggy gets home.”

“I will clock out at 8:30 PM precisely, Sheriff,” Iggy called from his desk.

“Well, good. All right.” He swung out the door.

He made it to the house, still too tense and fingers clenching and unclenching around his keys. It didn’t feel right to be here. Kuiil was in the fucking _morgue,_ there was a teenage girl (with a _gun_ ) missing, and a tiny nonverbal kid running hungry and barely dressed in the woods. And he was coming home in time for pizza and beer. Maybe Luke wouldn’t mind digging out some flashlights and going searching again? Who was he kidding, Luke was probably going to show up and _suggest_ it.

He hipchecked the front door open. The living room light flicked on and something fell with a loud clatter in the kitchen

The gun was out of his holster and aiming forward before he consciously decided it. He caught the front door with his foot and gently let it fall back into place. It didn’t quite close, but it was enough. Slowly, eyes squinting and thumb ready on the safety, he walked sideways, foot crossing carefully over the other. With a jerk, he turned around the half-wall that separated the living room from the kitchen/dining area. Nothing jumped out or shot at him, but he groaned, shoulders slumping. His fridge was hanging open and everything inside scattered all over the floor— luckily, he didn’t have much in there. He grabbed the fridge door and leaned around, only to roll his eyes, pistol lowering slightly, at the mess of shelves and drawers and torn or broken open packages. Ketchup, beer puddles, left over salsas, and pickled jalapeño juice was _everywhere_. When he kicked the mess aside and slammed the door shut, he noticed there was a lot more glass on the ground.

“ _Damn it_ ,” he whispered, seeing the glass panel in the kitchen door knocked in.

It was probably just a raccoon… a very strong and very hungry raccoon. He sighed and moved towards the hallway past the dining area, gun still held in his hands and thumb on the safety. The bathroom was empty and not a mess— that was a relief. The last room left was his bedroom. The bed was still untouched, pillow undented, but his closet door was ajar. Stiffening his jaw, eyes narrowing, Din lifted a foot and kicked it in, holding it back with his shoulder and his gun aiming at…

Big brown eyes wet with tears and tiny hands clutching a familiar yellow box.

“ _Shit_ , shit, I’m sorry-” The little boy under his hanging plaid lifted his hand as Din dropped his. “FUCK!” Din flew backwards, hit the bed, and rolled over the top. He kept his finger away from the trigger, but that was the only thing he managed to control as he flung ass over kettle to the other side of his room. He thudded to the ground with a loud groan. “What the _fuck_ was _that_?”

He sat up, a hand on his head, and looked through blurry eyes to see that tiny kid with the too-big eyes gazing around the corner of the bed with big, damp eyes. His hand began to rise and Din quickly lifted his empty hand, fingers splayed, and slowly began to lower his gun.

“Look, look, don’t… don’t do that, I thought you were a raccoon or a… well, not a kid. Look, the gun’s down,” Din said, words tripping over themselves and the gun set on the carpet.

The boy glanced down at the gun, then back at Din, then at the gun. With a furious glare, the gun rose into the air, over Din’s head, and crashed through his window to the outside. When Din looked back, eyes too wide and mouth gaping, the kid lifted a tiny fist to rub at his bloody nose. Still glaring suspiciously at Din.

“Okay. No guns. Good idea. I’m glad you didn’t take it for yourself, very responsible, kid,” Din said, voice low and soothing. The kid grumbled and hugged the box of Eggos to his skinny chest. He reached into the box, pulled out a half-eaten, still-frozen waffle, and began to gnaw on it. “Hey, kid, that’s… that’s not how you eat those.”

The kid _growled_ at him.

“All right, you know what, do whatever you want. But how about I heat them some of those up for you? No, no, you keep _that_ one,” Din clarified when the kid flinched and growled louder. It became discontented grumbles. “And then I take the rest in that box and I heat them. I promise they taste better hot. Aren’t you cold, kid?”

He was shaking pretty hard, hard enough that Din wondered how his bones weren’t clattering. Din gradually began to stand, inch by painful inch, as the boy squinted and skittered backwards, back into the closet. Din froze, then slowly stood up straight. He kept his back to the wall, his hands up high, and the kid in sight. He crept backward down the hall and winced as his boots squished banana peels. Suddenly, there was a loud, vigorous knocking.

Din jerked, spun towards the front door, and slipped to the ground so hard the whole house shook. From the bedroom, there was a high-pitched and muffled giggle. Din rose up on his elbows, groaning, to see that kid _laughing_ at him from around the doorjamb of his closet.

“Damn it,” Din said on a resigned exhale, dropping his head back and staring at the ceiling.

“Din!” Luke shouted through the door, knocking again. “Are you okay?”

The kid flinched and scurried out of sight. A few plaid shirts fell to the ground. So… back in the closet… Din got up to his hands and knees, then stumbled and grunted his way to the door. He jerked it open before Luke could knock again and stepped out onto the porch, quickly closing the door behind him so he couldn’t see the mess in the kitchen.

“Uh, hey,” Din choked. Luke rocked back on his heels, but there wasn’t far to go on the tiny porch, so they were pressed almost chest to chest. Din’s eyes darted away, feeling his cheeks heat when he caught sight of Luke’s equally red face. He was bracing two large, flat boxes between a hip and his wrist.

“Ah… hey?” Luke squeaked, the boxes wobbled a bit, but he pressed them closer to his hip. He shook his head and grinned, lopsided and rueful. “Evening, Din. I figured you’d be in late. So, I got pizza, but in my car I got flashlights, a few extra coats and blankets, and Chewie’s best hound. Her name is Shyo and she can smell weed from five miles away. I know this, because she smelled Han’s van five miles down the road. Don’t tell Han I told you he has weed in his van, also, don’t arrest him.”

“Luke, I’m not going to arrest Han,” Din said with an eyeroll. He glanced towards the battered station wagon where an all-white, droopy-eyed, and flap-eared hound was hanging her head out of the back window. “I… I don’t think tonight’s a good night.”

Luke’s eyebrows rose. “Din, I know you wanna be out looking, but so do I. I know Rose. She and Ben study at my place sometimes, she’s a good kid. And Han told me about the boy in the woods.”

Din pinched the bridge of his nose.

“I’m just saying, we’re gonna eat some pizza, I’ll make some coffee, and we’ll both go feel useful while also not sleeping. Which we’re both bad at, so, win-win,” Luke continued.

“I do want to get out there, I probably would be out there already, but I can’t. I just,” Din glanced towards his bedroom window, and quickly back at Luke when he remembered it was broken. When Luke turned to look, Din literally panicked. There was no other excuse. He grabbed Luke’s face in both hands and held him in place. Luke stared at him, eyebrows so high they disappeared behind his bangs, and his cheeks squished together.

“What?” Luke mumbled.

“Um, just, um, just look at me?” Din said stupidly.

“I’m… looking?” Luke was beginning to smile, a little distorted by his squished in cheeks. “So why’s it a bad night for roaming the woods for a few kids and what’s that have to do with you grabbing my face?”

“It’s… um, they’re not correlated?”

“Is that a question?” Luke began to laugh, his left hand rising and pressing Din back by the chest slightly. “I can look at you inside, Din. It’s getting cold out here.” He moved to scoot past Din towards the door.

“Y-yeah, n-no, you can’t… you can’t go inside,” Din finally blurted, grabbing Luke’s hand and stepping in front of him, blocking him.

“What? I’ve been coming over for three years,” Luke said incredulously. "You really think I care what it looks like in there or something?"

Inside, a door slammed shut and Din closed his eyes and whispered a low, fervent _fuck_.

“I have to- I can explain-”

The pizza boxes slammed into Din’s chest, pinned by the hook gleaming under the porch light as the bottom of a pie burned him through his khaki shirt. Luke was smiling, eyes glittering dangerously.

“I didn’t see her car, but I guess she needed a ride.”

“What?”

“Omera’s here. You just had to tell me.”

“ _What?_ Omera is not here. She’s back in Indianapolis by now,” Din said, baffled and utterly lost. “How do you even- fucking _Han_ ,” he muttered.

“Okay, I believe you. She’s not here. So who is?” Luke demanded, arms crossed over his chest. “Who’s so important you’re blowing off looking for those kids with me? That you won’t even let me _inside_?”

“Ah…” Din looked anywhere but Luke, his mouth and the corner of his eyes pinching. “No one?”

Luke turned on his heel and was down the stairs before Din could regret it. Which was fast, because he regretted that obvious lie _immediately_. The pizza began to slip out of the boxes and Din scrambled to hold them horizontally again.

“Luke!”

“I’ll see you in the morning. I have better things to do than watching you lie _terribly_ to my face,” Luke replied. He sounded breezy and casual, tossing the words over his shoulder like it didn’t matter. The tone had Din wincing.

“Luke, wait-”

“Are you gonna to lie to me again?” Luke asked, the front door of his station wagon creaking open. He glanced over at Din, who stared down at the misshapen boxes in his hands. “So my choices are stay here and watch you ineptly lie to me while standing on your porch, or going out and getting shit done in the woods. Right.” The car door slammed, the headlights blinding Din a second later, and Luke peeled out of the rutted and uneven driveway.

Din leaned back against his front door and banged his head back against the door a few times with a loud sigh. Then, he remembered what had pissed Luke off. “ _Fuck_.” The pizzas dropped to the ground.

Din scrambled down the porch to dig through the grass and shove his thrown gun into his belt at the small of his back. He all but flung himself around the side of the house to the kitchen door, but it wasn’t open. He jumped up the few steps and peered in to see the kid perched on the kitchen counter, balancing precariously on his knees, as he tugged at the freezer door. Din kept himself from shouting and scaring the kid, instead knocking quietly and whispering,

“Hey, hey, kid.”

He turned towards the door and stared at Din owlishly. He didn’t scream, fall, or… do the hand thing, so Din tried out a very weary, half-assed smile and pulled open the door to swing inside. Glass crunched under his feet as he crept closer.

“Hey, kid. Not very patient, are ya? Still hungry?”

The kid nodded, lip trembling.

“All right, I don’t know if there are anymore Eggos, but I’ve got pizza. Let’s get down- wait, no, you’ll step on glass,” Din said quickly snatching the kid up from under his armpits and dangling him over the ground before he could jump down.

The kid stared at him, curling his skinny legs up to his stomach but otherwise hanging like a ragdoll. A very freaked-out looking ragdoll.

“Ah, sorry, um,” Din stepped quickly over the mess and set him down on the carpet. “Why don’t you go sit on the couch. It’s comfy, well, it's more comfortable than the floor.”

The kid stared, blinked slowly, and stared some more. Din helpfully pointed to the lumpy old couch. The kid made a curious little noise and shuffled over the carpet, paused, then shuffled again with a giggle, tiny toes digging into the threadbare fabric. While the kid… experienced… carpet?, he slipped the gun out of the back of his pants and hid it in the nearest kitchen drawer. Din hurried to the front door before the kid could notice him dithering and maybe throw his service pistol at his head this time. The kid was bouncing up and down on the couch, feet kicking over the floor and hands braced on the cushions, when Din came back and opened the pizza box.

The cheese and pepperoni was smeared all over the top of the box, so it didn’t look pretty, but the kid’s eyes grew three times larger. He leaned forward on his hands, nose twitching, and he looked up at Din with his mouth gulping like a fish. Din’s mouth quirked upwards, the smile a little less weary, a little more genuine, this time, and he carefully peeled a slice out of the box and handed it over. The kid grabbed it in both hands, tomato sauce and cheese oozing between his fingers and dripping onto his shins and the carpet. He tore into the slice, smearing it everywhere, before Din could adjust his hold.

“Well, too late. Good thing this old mobile home is older than me,” Din said, chuckling a little. He grabbed his own slice and flopped to his butt on the floor, still facing the kid on the couch. The kid stopped, blinked, and moved the pizza around to hold it like Din did. Din grinned, actually _grinned_. “Good job, kiddo. You’re pretty smart, huh?”

The kid smiled. It was kinda bloody-looking with all the tomato sauce, cheese and grease shined over his dark skin, and one of his front incisors missing. But Din felt his own grin widening.

“My name is Din. I’m the sheriff here, so it’s kinda my job to keep you safe, all right? I’m sorry I scared you.” The kid burbled and made grabby hands at the pizza, his own slice all but inhaled already. Din huffed and handed him another. “Greedy, huh? I dunno how you got here, or where you came from, but… I’m glad at least one of you kids is safe.”

The kid stared at him owlishly. All the joy wiped off his face and he shivered all over, whimpering into his pizza slice.

“Oh, damn, you’re still in that thing. I’ll go grab you something warmer. I don’t have any kid clothes, not these days… but I guess you might not’ve like Winta’s old clothes either. I’ll be right back, don’t break anymore windows or… or go anywhere, got it?”

The kid just stared wordlessly at the pizza and whined and shivered.

In his room, Din dug through old shirts and gym shorts, trying to find something small enough and with a draw string to put on the kid. Clutching a plaid shirt he hadn’t been able to wear for almost a year, Din stopped for a moment, staring incomprehensibly at the checkered black and green and grey. Slowly, he fell to his ass and buried his face in his hands to let out a muffled groan.

How the _fuck_ did this all happen? And what was he supposed to do next?!

* * *

Rey gnawed on her fingernails, tearing them down to the wicks, a few of them bleeding. Paige had been so understanding, moving into action the minute she realized that Rey, Finn, and Poe were telling the truth. Apparently, them sneaking out to the concert hadn’t been very good sneaking; she’d overheard Rey and Rose whispering excitedly about it all last week. So when Rey had confessed what they’d done and the consequence of it, bracing for Paige’s rage for getting Rose in trouble, the immediately-wide-awake Paige had just put her hands on Rey’s shoulders, looked her in eyes, and said,

“ _You are not in trouble_.” Every word clear and precise. “Whoever took my sister is gonna be.”

Then, she bundled the teenagers into the rundown Corolla and forced her way into the Sheriff’s office.

Getting that ball rolling, seeing how fast the Sheriff had worked and the strange looks and comments he and his deputy had shared, had both relieved Rey… and also terrified her even more.

Something was happening in Hawkins. Something big. Paige’s pensive silence and heavy frown confirmed it as she drove the teenagers back to Starcruise Park and told them to go straight home. And to _not go looking_ for Rose.

Finn and Poe weren’t stupid, they had probably noticed the weirdness at the station and how it was so late, but everyone seemed to be so busy. _They_ had been a lot more willing to let the adults handle it, though. To trust them to figure it all out and bring Rose home.

Rey wasn’t so willing. Not when her stomach couldn’t stop clenching and the look on the deputy’s face kept flashing again and again in her mind.

> _‘Within the radius.’_
> 
> _‘Fuck.’_

_What_ radius? And what diner case? Cantina Pizzaria was downtown, close to the high school, and they all would’ve known if something had happened there. The only other diner was Kuiil’s truckstop down by the interstate exit. Rey stopped in the middle of her pacing, closed her eyes, and tried to think about where the diner was in relation to the trailer park. It was east of downtown, like Starcruise, but… other than that… they were nowhere near each other.

“AURGH!” Rey screamed and kicked her wall as hard as she could. The shitty plywood broke under her foot and she was _stuck in the freaking wall_. She flopped to her butt and began to shake, and shake, and _laugh_. Laugh until tears sprung at the corner of her eyes. Only the too-loud volume of the TV in the living room kept the Old Guy from screaming at her for _kicking a hole_ into the wall. Outside her room, the phone rang while Rey gulped in breath and curled over her knees.

“Girl! GIRL, the PHONE,” Old Guy screeched from the living room.

“Get it yourself!” Rey screamed back, wiping at her face with the heel of her palm.

“Don’t you talk back to me! I feed you-”

“I clothe you, I give you a roof over your head,” Rey muttered under her breath along with her screeching guardian. She struggled to her feet, yanking out the one from the wall, and shuffled down the hall. The phone was in the kitchen, still ringing. She shot the Old Guy an irritated glare. “You’ll have to turn the TV down.”

“Rude little brat,” he mumbled, turning the volume down by, like, a single decibel.

She rolled her eyes and picked up the receiver, sniffling. “Yeah?”

_Sssshhhhhh_

Rey frowned and pressed the phone closer, plugging the opposite ear with her finger. “Hello?”

_Sssshhhhh_

Only white noise. Wait, no.

Her heart leapt in her throat, thudded against her esophagus until she felt like vomiting. But, at the same time, she wanted to start crying again, relief almost knocking her down. “Rose? Rose, is it you?” she whispered, fingers clutching the phone desperately.

_Sssshhhh_

“Rose! Rose, please, say something, it’s me. It’s Rey. Rose?” Rey said louder, much louder this time. She ignored her granddad’s annoyed shout and held the phone so close to her ear that it started to hurt.

Just barely, under all the heavy static, was someone breathing.

“Rose, please, please say _something_ , where are you?” Rey begged. “The cops are already looking for you, they’ll find you, I promise, just give me _something_.”

There was a rumble, a wet snarl, and an icy cold dread dripped down Rey’s spine. She felt like prey, like something hunted, as the snarling grew louder and the quiet breathing sharp and shrill.

“Rose, run, _run_! Whatever it is _run!_ ” Rey screamed. “You stay away from her, you bastard- _ah_!” She shrieked as the phone in her hand zapped her. Hard enough her teeth ached and the skin of her jaw _burned_. She clutched at her face, then snatched up the phone, hesitated for a blink, then pressed it back to her ear. “Rose! Rose? Are you there? Are you okay?” she shouted desperately.

There wasn’t even a dial tone.

“ _Damn it! FUCK!_ ”

She slammed it down. Then, slammed it again, again, shouting until the phone fell off the wall with a jangling clatter to the ground. She stared at it, chest heaving, phone receiver hanging from limp fingers as the curled phone cord swung in the air.

“What the _hell_ is going on here?”

The Old Guy tottered into the kitchen doorway, leaning on his walker, his jaundiced yellow eyes gleaming in fury.

“It broke,” Rey said simply. She dropped the receiver and walked away. She didn’t even twitch at him screeching bloody murder at her back.

Rose was out there. Something was hunting her.

So Rey was gonna find her first.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay, so, the best part of this chapter was writing Din. omg, i had SO much fun writing in Din's POV. His scenes with Luke, and Dune, and HAN, OMG WITH HAN, were so fun. Luke is supposed to seem a little ooc, or remind you a bit more of ANH Luke. Just... go with it for now. All the characters are Star Wars verse characters. Even the teacher namedrop was from Clone Wars! You get a cookie if you recognize them. (Also, Chewie's hound dog's name is a canon creature from Kashyyyk lol) The backstory with Finn, Rey, and Ben will be explained a bit more and they won't ALWAYS be so antagonistic. For me, Rey always seemed like a get pissed when emotions are high, calm down after a few wild swings of the saber stop working out kinda person (tldr: rage first, figure it out second), and that's what I'm trying to do here.


End file.
